"Iron Lung" - Review

The stars have gone out. As humanity's fleshy remnants corrode, a convict (Mark Fischbach) is sealed into a metal submarine and set forth onto a mysterious world where the oceans are made of blood, in order to find something, anything which could save them...

(Credit: The Equinox)
A passon project written by, starring and directed by Mark Fischbach (a YouTuber known as "Markiplier", whose work I am unfamiliar with) who funded it himself (refreshingly and unusually: there are no production logos at the start, it's straight into the opening credits after the BBFC logo) and insisted on a cinematic release. Good for him, this is a triumph of the underdog and independent art: it's doing well, and is clearly a passion project for him.
As a directorial debut it's overly long, far too bloated, and Fischbah does not have a great grasp of tension, so the pacing is dog rough and leads to boredom rather than any rising dread. I for one was a sucker for the "Poltergeist" TV shot however. Fischbach is a fair actor, far better than expected for a YouTube content monkey, and acquits himself well enough, but is not strong enough for a premise such as this, though he does a solid enough job with a monologue towards the end. The support are fine (you can tell Troy Baker is in this because he advocates yanking a ladder up) with Caroline Rose Kaplan doing rather well, and the low budget is used impeccably: it's the kind of filmmaking I respect right there, well done. Andrew Hulshult's soundtrack is understated and rather good.
The film's cosmic horror and yo-yoing between genres feels less like unpredictability and more throwing everything at the wall and seeing what sticks. Funnily enough this creates an inverse problem of most modern horror movies in that the build up is tedious and uninspiring, but the ending blows it out of the park with the kind of madness and horror I would expect and need from a project like this. It does some Gibson-esque world building with a couple of its lines (not quite "They set a slamhound on Turner’s trail in New Delhi, slotted it to his pheromones and the color of his hair." or "flew a Gullfire over the fires of Leningrad" but things about the last tree burning for example are good) and uses the cost-saving lower budget aesthetic to build a world where humanity is on its last legs. However it wants to have its cake and eat it too: a casualty of the overlong runtime. It could strip back the dialogue and leave things to stew and dwell, but also does flashbacks and conversations which aren't as fleshed out as they should be, like trying to split the metaphors of a difference engine.
However.
As a debut project it is certainly ambitious, and more interesting to discuss than most. I always appreciate a swing and a miss more than something playing it safe.
There are enough sparks of interesting ideas here (the details of the submarine and processes of his investigation are highlights: they feel like an adventure game, and show a twinkle of craft) that I would like to see Fischbach (who seems like a lovely bloke, and I am ELATED somebody with as large a platform as he seems to have supporting cinema and art) move forward as a filmmaker. Would I buy it on DVD? Probably not. Would I urge you to support this art which seems to be resonating with a huge fanbase (and honestly if it gets them into any sort of smaller budget bottle movie horror and cosmic ideas or hell, gets somebody to watch the very reminiscent "Event Horizon" then fan-fucking-tastic) and is an earnest expression of a person in their form? Absolutely. This is the kind of art we need. I didn't like it, found it quite weak in fact, but holy hell what a swing. Good for you man!

"The Toxic Avenger - Unrated" - Review

In the corrupt, rotting city of St Roma, the chief industry is a heavily polluting pharmaceutical plant. It is here where widowed mild-mannered janitor Winston Gooze (Peter Dinklage) works to support himself and his stepson Wade (Jacob Tremblay), until a horrifying accident transforms him into a toxic beast ready to avenge himself upon the town that has wronged them!

(Photo Credit: IGN)
This is a movie tailor made for me.
The original Troma "classic" is the cornerstone and touchpiece for their brand of trash, outsider mayhem and gross nonsense, I proudly have Lloyd Kaufman's autograph, and a copy of the film in a trashy DVD on my shelf. I've listened to the musical multiple times (the only one I've done so outside of the Golden Age classics) and just adore this kind of outsider art. And when Macon Blair (behind the fucking excellent underrated genre-bender "I Don't Feel At Home in this World Anymore"), star of "Blue Ruin" and "Green Room" was announced to finally be the one going ahead with this long-squelching remake, my interest was piqued.
With my bona fides out of the way, let's get this part done with: There's nothing quite so Hollywood was taking an underdog cult trash classic piece of punk outsider art and remaking it glossier and with bigger stars; though it has Kaufman (now best known to the kids for his appearences in James Gunn movies) and Michael Herz behind the producing wheels, it still was stuck in development hell. Oh Hollywood.
It was always going to lose some of that lovably incompetent, wild, anarchic jank in the transition. That being said:
I fucking loved this.
From the opening shots being an overly Gothic-lit office with "Award for Good Journalism: Melvin Ferd" (the name of the lead in the Toxic Avenger musical) and him being played by Shaun Dooley (Barnsley represent!) before a bunch of weirdly dressed, chicken-headed, clown-make-up clad, parkour-flipping goons burst in and start trying to murder: I felt that Macon Blair has the same love for this movie as I do.
What follows is bloody, stupid, punky, outrageous, bloody, gory, stupid, juvenile, bloody and campy, with lots of gore and stupid blood to push things to the limit.
Dinklage cuts a man's face in half, revealing a pulsating brain, with a radioactive mop.
The chicken man gets a fucking fantastic gross pay off.
Kevin Bacon (embracing his weird era in films, side note watch "Super" and he's super fun in "Elephant White") hams it up to the extreme with his deliberately snarling, cartoonish dialogue.
Elijah Wood, also relishing his weirdo era, plays a put-upon "Igor" esque brother to Bacon, complete with atrocious hair and cane.
Peter Dinklage proclaims: "Alright, I need to get my dick out!".
Said dick is actually Chekov's gun.
At a murderous "post-hardcore punk" concert, reaction shots consist of flashed titties and penises.
The transformation into the titular creature is a deliberately 50s style psychadelic throwboack with headshots and swirling screens, done to the Mozart monster theme, you know the one.
It still has the outright gall and audacity to be an underdog story, a corporate satire, and a commentary on the American healthcare system (not a subtle one, but, come on man... we're past this) in the final cut.
This movie is far better made than the original, but puts that budget and effort into being gross, stupid, ridiculous and capturing the Troma sense of humour, without the mean-spiritedness (well... almost...)
It's a niche movie for a niche crowd, but I am that niche crowd.
I was laughing a lot, and when I wasn't laughing I was beaming from ear to ear.
I want Blair to go very far after this, unpredictable career that he has.
I guess if you like stuff like "Wolfcop", "Hobo With a Shotgun", "Street Trash", "The Stuff" and "Demons", go for this!
Fuck yeah.

"Wolf Man" - Review

Blake (Christopher Abbott) finally receives news that his father has officially been declared dead. So he takes his wife (Julia Garner) and daughter Ginger (Matilda Firth) to his old home in the woods, hoping to get away from it all and get his head together. But something attacks Blake in the woods and he begins to change. What could possibly be happening to him?

I like Leigh Whannell as a director: "Upgrade" is a phenomenally made low budget B-movie body horror nightmare, "The Invisible Man" did an excellent job updating its premise and having things to say (as well as using its low budget), the "Insidious" movies are bonkers good fun and remain of a relatively high consistency throughout (which is rare, particularly in horror series) and I enjoy "Death Sentence" for all of its unpleasantness, and "Cooties" is good fun. I was curious about this one, as he's not really had any duds thus far (the closest is maybe writing "Death Sentence", which is a rather ugly movie I remember enjoying, though a lot of people seem to slate "Dead Silence" and I am one of its few defenders even if Whannell doesn't), and "The Wolf Man" is a pretty difficult one to screw up, especially with the obvious readings you could add to it to make it a companion piece to "The Invisible Man" - rage and how it is a beast which changes men. Add to that Garner and Abbott and you have a slam dunk of a bottle movie!
Only, it's a dud.
It's infuriating to say that. The movie is called "The Wolf Man" so we know what he's going to turn into and what is happening, okay, fine, so you lean into the camp or the body horror. It does neither there, spending an inordinately long time in the cabin with a slow transformation. Okay, fine, it's about illness and how it transforms us and makes us monsters in the eyes of those we love. Again, no: the body horror angle is weak and underplayed (especially after stuff like "The Substance" in recent memory), so we have to hope it's going for a "confined in a tight space with the one you love as he turns violent" angle, but this too never reaches the tension it needs. The closest it comes is an attack atop a green house, but it's weak stuff, particularly if you compare it to stuff like "Crawl", "Hush", "Don't Breathe" and even the Soska Sisters' remake of "Rabid" (better body horror too in that case) in recent years alone. There is a token effort early on to hint at Blake maybe perhaps having rage issues, which could be the other metaphor they're going for, but again it's dropped and moved to the side in favour of their milquetoast locked room bottle movie. Thus we get a werewolf movie which takes too long to transform into a werewolf, loses the camp, fun and blood factor when it does, and isn't substantive and meaty enough or (crucially) tense and scary enough to sustain what is there, despite strong performances. I appreciated the "Ginger Snaps" reference with the daughter though, and that Benedict Hardie (the assassin from "Upgrade" and the job interviewer from "The Invisible Man") having another cameo in this as Whannell's mascot.
Honestly, if you wanted a great Abbott locked room horror film about change and violence, watch "Piercing".

"A Different Man" - Review

Edward (Sebastian Stan) is a meek, mild, shy and awkward aspiring actor with no self esteem and neurofibromatosis. His life is changed twice: first when a delightful aspiring playwright named Ingrid (Renate Reinsve) moves in next door, and they hit it off, sharing stories about his life and genuinely forming one of his genuine human connections, which may blossom into something more. Second, Edward is selected to be the participant in a trial for an experimental drug which may alter or even remove his condition...

A bold as brass, pitch black little comedy which, unusually, makes for a double-feature with "The Substance".
The first half is a sweet, dry, lovely awkward little character piece with tinges of body horror, shot like it was made in the 1970s or early 1980s (it's grainy, and has those zooms, closeups and edits like something made by Frank Henenlotter); there are well observed little details like the looks given to Edward by the passers by (a scene in the cafe is excellent for this) and the ever encroaching steady drip, drip, drip from the roof of his flat is simply excellent build up and metaphor for his growing problem...
Then comes the second half, where it becomes a different beast entirely. I can't say much, because this was genuinely such a pleasant surprise and a wonderfully awkward, anxiety inducing tale of envy, but suffice to say: the arrival of Adam Pearson as Oswald is an inspired character and a delightful performance, where the joke is that incredibly British thing of "this man is perfect and I hate him". The film has excellent performances from its main trio, in fact, and has a lot to say about not only how we as society tackle facial disfigurements, but also how we place on pedastals those with them and overcompensate, and our enduring awkwardness about it all. The "Metamorphosis" sub pastiche does not go unnoticed.

"The Substance" - Review

Workout star of a prime time show, and hottest thing on the planet, Elizabeth Sparkle (Demi Moore) has it all! But all good things must come to an end: she's 50 and, as made abundantly clear by her slithery boss Harvey (Dennis Quaid), there's no room for her in this industry now. Despondent and miserable, she finds her way back in: far from pulling a Mikey Saber, she instead uses "The Substance", to create a "newer", "hotter", "better" version of herself (Margaret Qualley), to ride high once again in that industry. All seems well, she has to follow a few rules and success seems given: Stabilize every day, swap every seven days, and remember that there is no she and her, only "Us". Fame, youth, beauty and more, are only an injection away...

Rightfully compared to David Cronenberg, I'd agree but not for the reasons people think when they immediately think Cronenberg: it has that almost asexual, clinical dissection of glamour and sex, that horniness and sleaze eyed up with an almost alien fascination and disgust which feels more akin to fascination than perversion. It's less titillating and more inquisitive and ponderous.
The whole movie is gorgeously shot, very French.
It has frequent wide angle lenses, immaculate colour design (the yellow coat and orange hallways are a particularly striking set of images), making for frequently bright, memorable imagery. There are a lot of wide angle and fish eye lenses, usually with an exquisitely ghoulish Dennis Quaid (playing his best Ray Liotta, RIP) far too close, adding disgust and discomfort effortlessly. And then the surgical, looming, disgusting gross body horror you came for is (whilst underplayed for a majority of the film, we'll get there...) neatly done, slow, effective, gross.
The sound design is the star of the show: I never want to hear a man eating shrimp ever again. Fucking gross There's a lot of food and consumption and devouring imagery and metaphors. The film descends into addiction, the biases and loaded decks and prejudices against women, the hypocrisy and vulgarity of the entertainment industry and society's double standards for women, and to this extent casting Demi Moore (giving one of her best performances in a lifetime) is an inspired piece of parody. She is great in this: her cookery scene is great fun, and encapsulates the movie well.
The final act is where you, I, and everyone with a semblance of understanding of horror movies, Cronenberg, body horror and pacing are expecting it to come together:
Oh boy it does that!

Deliciously gross, surprisingly rather "Society" inspired stuff (I kept humming the "Eton Boat Song" in my head, you'll see why...) comes alive in the finale: gross, bloody, manic, and a suitable slice of madness from what we have seen so far. It's not as unhinged as something like "Cuckoo", and is a more reserved, collected, orderly affair with something to say, but if you have the patience for it, and enjoy the Soska Sisters remake of "Rabid", I can recommend this.

"Out of Darkness" - Review

The year is 43,000 BC. A disparate group of humans stumble into the unfamiliar shore of a new world seeking shelter, food and a new beginning for their story. Adem (Chuku Modu) is the brutal hunter leading them. His mate Ave (Iola Evans) carries life within her. His brother Geirr (Kit Young) carries the spear to protect them. His son Heron (Luna Mwezi) is their hope for a new beginning. Old Storyteller Odal (Arno Luening) is the keeper of wisdom. And the new, recently rescued stray Beyah (Safia Oakley-Green) will be whatever their leader deems her to be, regardless of her wishes. These disperate, hungry people find themselves on the precipice of a new age, with something in the woods stalking them, blending into their nightmares, and bringing their nightmares to a horrifying reality which they must band together to face if they are to survive...

A startlingly bleak, stripped back and refreshing debut from Andre Cumming and screenwriter Ruth Greenberg, taking things back to basics.
The film is, at first, a minimalistic tale of survival: hunting for food, keeping an eye on one's children, escaping the cold, and chafing under the brutal but perhaps necessary rule of the leader. It's done with sweeping, cold, vast shots of the skyline which illustrate just how alone they are here; and the entire film is spoken in an artificial language, which is a really, really cool touch. The whole thing evokes those brutal, stark survival films we've been missing all these years, and its attention to details and superstition lay the bedrock for an increasingly dread-fuelled atmosphere. But Cumming and Greenberg don't neglect character either, weaving a complex dynamic in the tribe with simple choices from the actors and screenplay: Adem's rule, Geirr's idealism, Beyah's search for her place here, it's good writing. Safia Oakley-Green is the real standout here.
Then when the supernatural comes in, the monster beyond the treelines and the haunting, bloody horrors it brings, and the film keeps up the pace, though wobbles a little bit, before sticking the landing: becoming a movie about violence and its cycles, and the primal, deep rooted horrors of the unknown...
It stays brutal, stark and on message, and ends on a dark, grim, but still somewhat hopeful note.
I highly recommend it.

"Aunt Beth's Babysitting Adventure" - Review

Guitar technician Beth (Lily Sullivan) has been estranged from her sister Ellie (Alyssa Sutherland) for a few years now. But she's in town, and willing to catch up. Ellie is a single mother to 3 children: aspiring DJ Danny (Morgan Davies), activist Bridget (Gabrielle Echols, who looks like a budget Selena Gomez) and amusing and savvy Kassie (Nell Fisher); and is trying to scrabble money together from her tattooing business to support the 4 of them before they are forced to leave their soon-to-be-demolished home. Together, they have differing ideas on motherhood, outlooks on the other's lives, and grow to bond over a dark and stormy night mirroring the tumult of their relationship.

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We had 4 walkouts and my girlfriend was fear-sweating throughout, whilst the friend next to me was pleading for shit to stop.
10/10, solid follow up. Weird sequel to "Hole in the Ground" though.

"Infinity Pool" - Review

One-hit wonder writer James Foster (Alexander Skarsgard) and his wealthy wife Em (Cleopatra Coleman) take a holiday in the seaside county of Li Tolqa, hoping to find inspiration for James. But whilst the resort is lovely, and filled with activities and delicious breakfast, the walls are tipped with barbed wire, and te country oozes a sense of malice. When James falls in with British tourist Gabi (Mia Goth) and her French husband Alban (Jalil Lespert), the country, and his soul, are laid bare. Whilst we may not like what we see, James finds himself fascinated...

Brandon Cronenberg's 3rd effort is a fascinating, but inconsistent beast - much in the vein of his father! It has a dark, weird, unsettling atmosphere (the resort is in wahsed out colours, punctuated by sickly yellows, and later as our protagonist gets himself into deeper holes, we have closeups on the eyes and lips) and a deranged, gory nightmare sequence which would be right at home in his previous work "Possessor" or "The Neon Demon" (side note: "Possessor" fucking rules!), and when it plays its trump card and high concept idea: it's a fantastic one. The central premise (which I won't go into) really opens up ideas of rich, perverse, deranged examinations of the ugliness of the soul, and makes you go: "yeah, of course people would do that fucking thing! Because the rich are scum!" yet also looks briefly at what a society allowing such a thing would do. Its first half is easily the strongest: Skarsgard goes on his discovery, and the decadent games of Gabi, Alban and their crew of assholes is brutal and unhinged to watch. Plus the ever under-appreciated Thomas Kretschmann (whom I love) has a memorable part as a stern detective named "Thresh". It explores how we're, fundamentally, bad, and looks at the soul and who we really are.
Its second half (despite some great gore effects, lighting and aforementioned nightmare flesh orgy) is where it gets a little meandering and runs out of steam. A character just leaves the movie, and whilst it makes some semblance of sense, it loses something as a result, and spins its wheels for a while. Whilst its central premise could go many places, the twist and plot it ends up with don't quite work for me, going for a "you were always the one" culty angle which feels a bit like a cop-out. The ending is still strong, and it does all make some semblance of sense, but it lacks the electrifying plot and grip of "Possessor" or even "Antiviral".
I still recommend it, as a weird culty little film people will find stuff to examine and talk about, which is what I want from this sort of thing, and especially from a Cronenberg.
Plus, if you're into that sort of thing, Mia Goth breast feeds a man, Alexander Skarsgard shows trunk frequently, and has an extended scene where he puts on a dog-collar bollock naked and is referred to as "dog" and only growls.
Enjoy?